Chelsea boss Maresca and captain James praise ‘perfect’ Blues youngster for helping his side to Conference League final | OneFootball

Chelsea boss Enzo Maresca lauded 16-year-old Reggie Walsh as a “perfect” player after helping his side reach the Conference League final.

Walsh started in the Blues’ 1-0 semi-final second-leg win over Swedish side Djurgården as Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall scored the only goal of the game to give Chelsea a 5-1 aggregate win.

And Maresca was keen to praise youngster Walsh for his full debut for the club.

He said: “What do you think, you like him? Good, eh? I like Reggie, I love Reggie because he’s that kind of player that, in my system, in the way I want to play, it’s perfect. You struggle to find players so young. He’s 16. And you see how I was asking for the ball, how good he is on the ball.

“Now, for sure, the most important thing for him is that he continues to study, he continues to go. I ask him now, tomorrow he has to go to school. It’s important for him, he has to continue on that. But for sure, he’s a good player. We finished with Reggie ’08 [born], Shimmy [Mheuka] and Genesis [Antwi] ’07, and Josh [Acheampong] and Tyrique [George] ’06. It’s second team, it’s not even first team, it’s second team.

“So it’s fantastic for the academy, it’s fantastic for Chelsea, it’s fantastic for the fans because the future can be important. Good feeling.”

Reggie Walsh is PERFECT | Enzo Maresca | Chelsea 1-0 Djurgarden – YouTube

Asked how Walsh reacted when he found out he was starting, Maresca responded: “He was happy, he was laughing. He was surprised also because of his personality. He was not worried at all, he was laughing.

“I told him you have to play in the same way that you do training session with us. Enjoy, ask for the ball, enjoy. And you can see that he was doing well.”

Blues captain James also praised the youngster, telling TNT Sports: “I’ve seen him in training but training and games is different but this is the first time I have seen him play. I didn’t realise how good he actually was.”